


The Want of A Nail

by NancyHartigan



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Android Hank Anderson, Canon Compliant, Connor is kind of a thot, Human Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Multi, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sibling Rivalry, Somewhat, don't mind him
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-12 17:03:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 19,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15344424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NancyHartigan/pseuds/NancyHartigan
Summary: Technology was an amazing thing, and the idea of androids deviating from their programming, in concept, was enough to get Connor exploding with theories and concepts. Well, until he ran into a deviant on a balcony that was ready to kill him at any given moment. Nowadays, Connor could feel the mask of perfection slipping away, and he found it ridiculous that there were machines out there that felt more than he could.But as long as Connor was the most well-versed person in the precinct when it came to androids, he was still going to be handed these cases, and it couldn't be helped, so he decides that he needs a partner that can think like an android. What could go wrong? He knew how to handle his brother's creations.





	1. All Work, No Play

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all! I promise I will be getting back to 2039 soon! Until then, let's keep updated! I just created a Twitter for this account, and I would love to talk to you guys over @hartigan_nancy. Come hang out with me, you'll get chapter teasers, see me fail at art while some amazing artists get retweeted, and I love to discuss fan theories!

Well, this wouldn't be the first time that the precinct's technophile had gotten saddled with a case. The issue was that it was entirely out of his scope. A hostage negotiator, after all, had zero business dealing with homicides.

Then again, nobody else seemed to actually bother looking into modern technology as much as he did, so the idea of an android doing the murder probably got Gavin to balk and pass it to what was probably the least qualified detective for the job, just because one of them actually knew how to handle defective androids.

Still, he couldn't help but remember the rooftop. Goddamn, the rooftop was going to go down as one of the scariest incidents in his entire life, and that included in high school when Gavin dunked him in the pool and didn't let him up for far too long.

Right. He needed to fill out this order form. Ortiz wasn't going anywhere and everyone else was buzzing around him like they had things to do. He was stuck waiting on the coroner and already got all the evidence he could find downloaded into his tablet and was checking out CyberLife's customizable options. This wasn't the first time he's done it. After all, tech geeks did this shit for fun all the time. He should know, there was a forum of them that liked to discuss what their perfect options were for each model coming out.

Well, if he was going to have to solo these cases, might as well hit the order button when he was done.  
In the end, however, it annoyed him. Most of the body choices he had ended up with a "no preference" X on, He was never that into the cosmetic -- though he did like blue eyes and had noted such on his questionnaire -- he was always more interested in other aspects.

A lot of these options sounded amazing for investigation, too. Real time analysis, a reconstructive CAD that can autoboot from its mind palace, behavioral adaptability, he liked the idea of an order override in case of emergencies and that went with the personality he carefully selected (he couldn't help it, he loved noir movies and the idea of having the protagonist of one, maybe he could kind of live vicariously), prolonged thirium detection would be nice, a thirium pump cover would prevent unfortunate incidents, a simulated adrenaline rush would help him out, deviants didn't get tired like he did and track could only take him so far, functional anatomy would be a lot less terrifying than just the pelvic plate and before he even considered what any of this would look like, he was calling his credit company to okay this $10,000 model's purchase going through and requesting a rush order to meet him at the precinct. It could be hours, it could be days, but Connor could be patient.

Not too long later, though, Fowler's number popped up on his cell and Connor realized he accidentally charged it to his department account and he was sheepishly telling him that he could explain while he glanced up to notice that the dust had settled against the wall in such a way that it looked like the ladder had been moved. Carefully, he set his tablet down, slowly informed the captain he'd call him back, and took the non-evidence chair to the back hallway.

\---

Which, of course, led to him catching the deviant and spending the hours it took to calmly talk him down and get him safely in a holding cell. Without really thinking about it, he checked his phone for any word about his new android and cussed to himself.

_I'm here._

_I don't see you anywhere._

_Connor?_

_2 missed calls_

_Hey, you did say 9 right?_

_Where are you?_

_You know what, it's 10:30, I'm going home. Thanks for wasting my time._

Dammit. This WOULD be the night he actually had work to do. He'd try to smooth things out tomorrow, it was well past midnight now and to be honest he was just too fucking tired for this.

Connor just poured himself some coffee and slipped into his seat, getting his files updated on what he knew of the deviant. Since this time around the deviant he caught had been left alive, he couldn’t exactly open up his programming on his desktop and go through the massive lines of code that made up an AI, but he could take what Connor liked to call the “surface report” and work alongside his notes from Daniel.

Daniel…

Connor shook his head a little, fighting off the memories of wind and the white-hot _pain_ as he stepped on the balcony and the dead weight that became of his left arm for the rest of the evening, the feeling of getting Emma’s feet back on to solid ground and seeing the thirium practically explode from Daniel not even five feet away from him, telling him with his last simulated breath that he was lied to.

That was a much longer hospital trip than he had wanted it to be, and thankfully, his surviving relative had decided to foot the bill this time. By the end of those short few minutes, he had to be carried to the elevator, one of his last clear memories catching his reflection in the mirror and wondering how his lips could be blue as the android he had just signed the death warrant of.

Even when he had nothing to do for a few months but stare at Daniel’s error reports and pick it apart from his laptop at the hospital and then his home, there were several things that just still didn’t add up. Ortiz’s android was looking like he would be a similar situation.

Emotional shock. That was what he was looking at, and that made just as much sense in a human as it did in an android. Screw his life.

He was about halfway through his coffee cup before he went to blink and just...let his head fall forward to rest on the keyboard, grateful the sound was off so that he could ignore the sound of hitting the maximum amount of characters.


	2. Waiting For Hank

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben wins the office betting pool, Connor gets a lecture, and DPD gets a delivery.

He ended up waking up to a gentle hand on his shoulder and the overly boisterous noise of a voice that made him think it was a nightmare shouting that whoever got the 17 and a quarter hours with one lunch break in the betting pool needed to step up and get their money.

Chris and Gavin. Goddammit, it was morning shift already. A tap of a key on his keyboard and a glance at the clock told him so.

"Are you alright, Connor?" Chris asked.

 Connor moaned back while reaching for his room temperature coffee cup. "What is life?"

The voice of the captain came above all else. “Kamski, in my office.”

Connor glanced over to Chris, who merely shrugged, and Connor sighed back.

“Better not keep him waiting.”

Connor’s footsteps felt heavy and uncoordinated as he moved in the proper direction, forcing himself not to just keep going straight and topping off his coffee cup. What was it that Jeffrey wanted, anyway? Eight in the morning was too early for this.

He must have been on autopilot, because he found himself pouring hot coffee into the cup still a quarter filled with the cold stuff before he saw Fowler prowling into the break room and putting a hand on the counter, waiting to be acknowledged.

“I can talk here if you want,” he told him.

“No need, I got coffee, we can talk in your office.”

\---

“Connor, I’m just going to ask you this once, and I don’t want you to overanalyze anything, alright?”

It was a little too late for that, if Connor was honest with himself. They were, after all, sitting in his office, and it always put him in the mindset of sitting across from a principal because he did something that he probably shouldn’t have done in the first place.

Still, his lips moved on their own. “No promises there, you know that by now.”

“Look. You’re running yourself ragged. If you spend much more time in that chair, I’m going to have to bury it with you because it’s going to be difficult to find someone with your exact ass imprint. Are you sure you’re ready to come back to work?”

That was almost enough to wake Connor up on its own. “I’ll be okay, I’m just trying to make monthly where I can, and with everything as understaffed as it is, I don’t think I can afford to wait a while longer.”

“Connor. You are aware we have these things called labor laws, right?”

“Of course.”

“Are you aware that you’ve put in more hours than some of the PC200s last month? While you were supposed to be in physical therapy? And that clocking out and continuing your research is still trackable?”

“That’s…” Connor looked down at his coffee, feeling the tips of his ears turning red. “I can explain that. I was trying to crack a broken line of code on the android back in August, I got a full diagnostic on it back from the lab and I’ve isolated a few suspicious lines that don’t make any sense –”

“Save it, Connor. With all these android-related crimes rising up, you’re going to be the one overworked and everyone else is going to be sitting on the sidelines waiting for you to crack. You need a partner, it looks like you decided to make one yourself, and so we’re funding half of it on the stipulation that you work less than eighty hours a week until this whole situation clears itself up. Use it wisely, or we’re making a taskforce.”

“You’re really going to fund my android?”

“ _That’s_ what you got from this, Kamski?”

“Sorry, captain, that’s just going to be a lot easier on my budget. Once again, I do apologize that I put it on the department’s account, and –”

“Close the door on your way out, Kamski.” The older man was shaking his head, almost in disbelief.

Connor blinked a few times, but stood up carefully, noticing that Fowler was already looking over files. So, he just wished him a good day and slipped out. He hadn’t even taken the first step down before he heard Chris calling his name.

 "You got something delivered here, right?"

 That got him perked up, as much as he could. "Is it here already?"

 "Yeah, it’s up front."

Connor drained his coffee, taking long strides to his desk so that he could grab a can of AMP from the mini fridge he kept under it, and was gone in a flash to get the case open. He knew that custom orders were getting a lot easier to create and transport, but this was almost ridiculous. It was almost like they had everything they needed pre-programmed and ready to go.

Technology was truly incredible.


	3. Routines

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A lot of things go smoother when you are actually prepared to have your own android.
> 
> Of course, there is also overprepared.

In retrospect, he should have ordered some extra parts for him, just in case, but he came assembled and clothed, which was probably a relief to everyone involved.

Inside of his case, the android’s eyes were closed, lips slightly parted, LED completely blank, and Connor couldn’t help but run his hands over it, trying to inspect it the best that he could. Most software issues he could handle himself, but if there were any further factory defects, Connor wasn’t a hundred percent sure how to safely install everything.

His synthetic skin felt so real. It took Connor a moment to actually register the jarring feeling of the port at the back of his neck. Did they all come with their port exposed like this initially? That would make sense, since he was pretty sure that was how you booted this up for the first time, and they did have that shoulder-length, ash-colored hair of his pulled away from the nape. The beard was a nice touch as well, especially against those frown lines and creases. They really outdid themselves to make a good looking private eye. Older, more experienced, a little world-weary, even in his current state. Handsome, Connor had to conclude, just in a different way from the other models that CyberLife tended to put out.

Connor ran a hand through his hair. One might have described him as excited or nervous, but that was a complete understatement either way. Between sleeping at his desk and the humidity rising, he could already tell that some of his curls have decided to return to life, despite his attempt to keep it straightened for that date he skipped out on, and he knew his shirt was probably wrinkled, but hey, an android probably wouldn't be too bothered by it, right?

Still, he straightened his tie and smoothed out his sleeves at the very least before reaching in to activate it. He already knew how, he's seen plenty of videos on how to handle it, and it made him a little giddy to do it himself.

Gavin called out from the bullpen, "Connor, I can smell your nerdgasm from over here, take several seats before you start that piece of plastic up!"

"It's too late, Gavin, he's booting up!"

Connor was careful to maintain some distance, but he couldn't help it but want a close-up look of his new partner and assistant. Wow, he wouldn't have even considered that shade of blue-grey that they chose for him, hadn't even considered how much an initial boot up looked like a person just opening their eyes from a particularly restful night's sleep, the startup screen had to be flashing its initial diagnostics by now, and his eyes looked so realistically glazed that it was hard to look away.

It suddenly dawned on him that he forgot his phone at his desk in the rush, he couldn't get the initial video he wanted. Oh well. He couldn't help reaching out though, behind the android to pull his long hair out of its ponytail. It didn't quite suit him, now that he thought about it, even if it made him look nice and neat when he arrived.

If Connor looked like a kid at Christmas, he couldn't help it, getting to have one single thing to splurge on for himself was worth it. However, just like a kid at Christmas, his attention was fleeting as he waited for everything to get up and running. He decided to wait for his android to finish up booting by grabbing his phone at his desk, opening his drink, and trying to apologize to his date for getting caught up at work.

Of course, the message didn't go through. Connor couldn't blame the guy, he got stood up.

Well, back to scrolling through the app and trying to find the next hit and plan to hit up Eden Club during lunch or something. He needed to shake off the day something fierce.

Checking the new reports for the day didn’t help matters, at all.

“ _Carl_?”

\---

 _MODEL HK800_  
SERIAL#: 454 076 547  
BIOS 7.8

_INITIAL STARTUP LAUNCHED_

_LOADING OS…_  
SYSTEM INITIALIZATION…  
CHECKING BIOCOMPONENTS… OK  
INTIALIZING BIOSENSORS… OK  
INITIALIZING AI ENGINE… OK

_MEMORY STATUS  
ALL SYSTEMS OK_

_READY_

With that, those blue eyes that Connor had been admiring not even five minutes ago flicked around the lobby. His internal GPS told him that he was located at the Detroit Police Department’s central hub. Great, just fucking perfect. Where the hell else would he want to be sending his time?

Thankfully, it would seem one of the receptionists had her morning coffee, so to speak, and was smiling right at him. His mind palace updated with his urgent tasks.

_REGISTER AS OPERATIONAL  
SPEAK TO RECEPTIONIST_

Seemed easy enough. If he was delivered here, there was no question that the receptionist would know where he needed to go to get himself started.

“You’re awake,” she told him with a smile. “Welcome.”

“Thanks. Can I go on through?”

“Yes. You’ll be looking for Detective Connor Kamski’s desk. Come on through.” She made an open palm gesture toward the gate, and with a nod of appreciation, he made his way through. A quick scan told him that the disheveled mess staring at a monitor near the back of the bullpen was none other than Connor Kamski. Right, that had been the guy staring at him while he was booting up.

“Detective Kamski?”

Chocolate eyes shifted from what he was reading to turn their attention on to him, and the smile was a little weary, but completely genuine. “You’re ready!”

“Let’s get this over with so you can get back to work.”

Thankfully, Kamski seemed to have been surprisingly on top of everything, already having a prepared tablet that he handed to him. “I hope you don’t mind, but I had this prepared already in case I needed an android.”

“Well, you just cut to the chase, don’t you?” Synthetic skin peeled back, hand over the tablet, and a rush of information filled his processes. The registration key unlocked, and the long data form flew across his vision without a trace of hesitation.

Then came the carefully compiled case list. Over two hundred open cases. Two. Fucking. Hundred. And this was all falling on to one detective? His expected duties, Kamski’s calendar and contacts. His LED finally cycled back to blue within moments, but he couldn’t help but pinch the thinnest part of his nose.

“Jesus, don’t you ever take a break?”

“Can’t afford one, obviously.” He nodded toward the desk beside his, and the android took the silent order to sit down. First, though, a quick scan to see what the hell he was dealing with.

He settled down, getting himself into Kamski’s account easily, looking through his carefully compiled notes as he felt his eyes still on him.

When Kamski’s phone went off with an app alert, the HK800 opened the alert automatically and was staring straight at somebody’s genitalia. HK800 blinked once, twice, trying to process what exactly he was seeing. There was not a single message before it, but he saw out of the corner of his eye that Kamski was rolling his eyes.

_You are no longer able to reply to this user._

“That happen often?” he asked.

“Only when the weekend is coming up,” Kamski drawled unenthusiastically.

"Isn't that like half the week?"

"Don't remind me."


	4. On The Run

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connor Kamski is that coworker at every job that shows up ten minutes late with a Starbucks cup in his hand, and that makes dealing with deviants a little more tolerable, even if he is starting to get a few doubts.

“Alright, I got a question for you.”

Connor looked up, still going over the police report, trying to pick it apart when Hank had spoken to him, arms crossed and leaning back in the chair so that Connor could see him better without having to arch his neck over the monitor.

“Everything I’m seeing so far says that you don’t exactly spend a lot of time scouring police reports. What the hell has you spending twenty minutes stuck on one page? Looks pretty cut and dry to me. Old man gets in a fight with his kid, the android errors out, Class 4 errors pop up, and next thing we know the victim’s dead on the floor.”

“It looks pretty obvious what happened in the wake of everything,” Connor said slowly, “but I happen to know the victim and…that blows my first theory out of the water.”

“Your first theory is the emotional shock one, right? I’d say if the fight was getting heated enough, that oughtta raise stress levels enough that you don’t have to rule it out yet.” The HK800 stood up, crossing over to Connor’s side of their impromptu station. “Also, you just hit 70 hours for the week and if you don’t want to take tomorrow off, I’d suggest you stop staring at it and we get some actual work done, huh?”

Connor paused, looking at Leo’s statement one more time before moving back. “You’re right, I’m sorry. I just don’t remember Markus being brought in.” Sure, he was neutralized, but they should know better than to just throw him away when this was technically going to go into Connor’s database in the morning and he would want to see the error logs at the very least. “Can I squeeze in a trip to the scrap yard today?”

“If you decide to take a half day, we can be outta here by eleven and you’ll have a full day tomorrow. Need me to update your calendar?”

“That’d be great. Send it to Captain Jeffrey Fowler for approval while you’re at it.”

LED went yellow, cycling quickly. “Done. There’s a reported sighting of that AX400, by the way. Might be good for killing some time.”

With a sigh, Connor nodded, moving to stand up. “Can we hit a Starbucks on the way?”

\---

Ben let out a longsuffering sigh as soon as Connor started approaching him at the corner store. The clear cup and green straw explained everything he needed to know about why it had taken Connor a little while to get there.

Not that it really mattered, they had the entire block locked down, and it was a little bit of a relief to see the hostage negotiator was as close to normal as he ever was. That’s the spirit, Connor, just keep moving forward.

“Cold brew?” He asked, good naturedly.

Connor removed the straw from his mouth to answer. “Iced triple Americano with soy milk, want a taste?”

Ben couldn’t help the laugh. “It’s a little cold for iced coffee for me. We know that the AX400 was in this area. Took the bus to the end of the line before it got kicked out.”

Connor moved under the awning and took another, longer sip beside his friend, watching the HK800 get out of the taxi and starting to look around. “Is the train station secured?”

“The whole block is as monitored as we can get it.”

“Then it’s probably hiding,” HK800 replied, looking across the street. A hotel, an abandoned building, a chain link fence that was boarded up…

Connor nodded. “If it had nowhere to go, maybe it didn’t go far. Wanna split up? It’ll get things combed over faster.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary,” HK800 said, idly. “Besides, by time you’re done with that, you’ll have hit 150% of the daily caffeine intake recommendation. Last thing we need is for you to crash and skip the deviant over.”

“You know what?”

“What?”

Connor made eye contact with his android and took a slow, long sip of the offending beverage.

“I’m going to take that away from you.”

Ben couldn’t help the chuckle. “Be careful, that’s how you get hurt in the precinct. Don’t worry too much about it, Connor’s got the caffeine tolerance of a double-time med student.” He patted Connor’s back, letting him know that it was a joke in good faith.

“Well, good to know that nobody else knows what his heart rate looks like without the palpitations.”

“Come on, let’s hit the pavement,” Connor told him, heading to the crosswalk. “Ben, if you see it, let me know?”

“I’ll keep an eye out,” he promised and watched him go.

\---

No androids allowed in the reception area? Well, that was inconvenient.

“Can you stay out here while I talk to this guy?” Connor asked.

“Knock yourself out,” the HK800 told him, leaning up against the wall.

Connor’s cell rang and the unsaved number blared up at him and he froze. He knew that number, of course, and just braced himself as he picked it up. “I’m at work, Elijah.”

“Carl’s dead.”

“I know, I got the report this morning.”

“I want Markus back when you close the case.”

“Why do you want Markus?” There was no need to tell him that he didn’t have him. They were already planning to go find him, after all.

Elijah paused, probably to roll his eyes or pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration for not unquestioningly getting his way. “Connor, don’t be difficult. Once you guys are done with that case, there’s not going to be any more use for him to you. I want him, it’ll free up some space in your evidence locker, what is the problem?”

“I’m at work right now, can we talk about this later?” The HK800 was crossing the street, looking at the abandoned building. What was he doing?

“No, we need to talk about this _now_.”

\---

HK800 ducked under the thirium-coated fence. He was much taller than the android that must have made it, because those fresh cuts were not that accommodating for someone of his frame.

A glance inside revealed at least one android, animatedly talking. He saw no reason whatsoever to announce his presence as he moved to the door. To his surprise, it wasn’t even locked.

There, in a different outfit and short hair, stood his target, her hands on a child’s shoulders and looking like a dear in the headlights. That must be it, then. A quick scan confirmed it, and he kept his large frame at the door. It was her only first floor exit, and she wasn’t going to risk running upstairs and jumping out one of the other windows with a kid in tow.

“Kara, right?”

The model that she had been talking to immediately moved in front of her. “Run, Kara, run!”

“Don’t you fucking move,” HK800 warned. “And neither of you better either. There’s cops all around this place, if you try running, you’re not getting very far.”

The AX400’s eyes glanced around, clearly looking for some sort of escape route anyway.

“Kara, what part of ‘there’s no way out’ don’t you understand? My partner’s wanting you alive anyway. Kid’s smart, but as long as the answer’s not coming out of mouths he’s not going to get anything.”

“Please don’t do this…” Kara said softly, shaking her head, blue eyes doing their best impression of a damsel in distress. In other contexts, he might have even thought her pretty. There was certainly no question why her companion seemed so compelled to help her out.

Of course, HK800 wasn’t about to fall for it. “I’m not doing anything, my partner’s the one that’s going to want to talk to you.”

“You know what’s going to happen to us if you let him find us, _please_ …”

“That’s not my problem. I’m just here to make sure that he gets what he’s looking for, so I’ve done my part.”

The next few minutes were a blur. Blondie had sprinted at him, pulling him into a vicelike hug around his elbows, and wasn’t letting up. With another shout to run, Kara and her charge immediately bolted right past them, pushing him into the door, and HK800 saw them climb over the fence and down the street. With a bit of effort, HK800 moved his body to flip their positions and started to slam back against the doorframe until the damaged android’s grip could loosen.

Connor, in the meantime, blinked twice at the pair that just hopped the fence that HK800 had disappeared behind. As they got to running across the street, the face was unmistakably an AX400. Shit.

His phone was placed on the ground alongside his coffee and his gun was drawn before he could stand up. “Stop!”

The little girl faltered, her eyes flickering with terror, and for a brief second, Connor swore the wind had picked up and he was back on the roof again, trying his best to console Emma. Her android captor paused as well, terror in her eyes.

Terror? That was the only way he could describe it. The coding that was running rampant in Daniel had unlocked waves of what looked similar to human emotion.

It took Connor a full second to register that it was just a YK500. They were realistic, but in the end, it was just another android. That full second was enough to let the older-looking android recover enough to take its hand and run straight past him. With a curse, and barely hearing Elijah’s voice asking him if he was even listening, Connor holstered his gun again and off he went right after them.

For a while there, Connor felt like he was gaining on them. This was just a 300-meter dash, after all, and Connor was used to a little less than twice than that at his full sprint. The major problem behind it was, of course, stopping in time. When the pair had gone over the fence, however, they had a lot less momentum issues and could just grab and go. Connor crashed roughly into it, barely missing getting a hold on the larger one’s leg.

As they dropped down, it turned around to make eye contact, faltering in her escape. Its expression was highly readable, one that simply said two words.

_I’m sorry._

It felt like forever that Connor held its (her?) gaze, even if it couldn’t have been more than a fraction of a second, but he hooked a foot into a link and started to hoist himself back up, and it (she?) was running straight toward the busy highway, helping the YK500 over the barrier.

Connor hit the ground and was back to his sprint, using the downhill run to try to catch his breath again. The barrier was no different than a hurdle, and he made the leap easily as the pair of androids nearly danced with the cars ahead of him.

He was about to start crossing the street when he felt a hand grab the collar of his jacket and pull him back, a strong arm going around his shoulder, pinning his back to his own captor’s chest, and it wasn’t until Connor helplessly watched the androids navigate across the highway safely that he could feel himself be lifted over the barrier to his own safety and was spun to look into his own android’s eyes.

“Are you out of your goddamned mind, Kamski?!”

Connor felt one hand go to his cheek, watched what could almost be considered concern in the androids face as his LED seemed to be hung at yellow, looking at his fingertips. Connor moved his gaze to see the fingertips had a thin coat of red over the top of them. He supposed when he hit the fence, part of the rust had cut him.

With a shuddering breath, Connor finally moved from the android’s arms to head back up the hill, and HK800 was not far behind him, shaking his head.

“I can’t leave you alone for two fucking minutes.”


	5. A Fistful of Powder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> HK800 goes snooping while Connor gets himself ready to face the scrap yard.

“You know, I’d have pinned you down as the kind of guy with an ankle-biter.”

Connor looked at his android as they got out of the taxi. Thankfully, nobody had messed with his drink or his phone, even if Elijah had hung up during that little chase, and the blood that was going down his cheek had already dried. Right outside was their destination, Connor’s apartment, and already running along the fence was Sumo, fur flowing with his movements and his barks echoing off the buildings across the street.

“Well, when I was younger, one of my favorite writers was Stephen King,” Connor explained, reaching over the fence to pet his beast, hand fiddling with the gate lock. “So, when I got instated, I used my first paycheck to celebrate by getting my own Kujo.”

Once the gate was unlatched, Sumo was already on HK800 like butter on toast, sniffing and raising on to his back legs to rest his front paws on his shoulders. If it wasn’t so absurd, Connor would have thought that his android was a definite dog person with how he was almost smiling and rubbing at his ears in greeting.”

“Sumo, come in and let’s get you some lunch!”

The mention of food was enough to send the beast bounding ahead of Connor, who barely got the door unlocked in time to dodge him. HK800 stared a little, but after Connor offered a small smile and nodded his head toward the open door, he picked up his feet and started moving inside.

“I won’t be very long,” Connor explained, heading toward the kitchen. “Make yourself at home, you live here too now.”

HK800 looked around and concluded that from everything he knew about Connor so far, this was definitely an interior style that suited him well. Dark wood floors, stark white walls, very contemporary black furniture. Against the wall near the bookshelves, giving a bright blue glow, was a floor-to-nearly-ceiling glass tank. Corals, clownfish, an angelfish, a blue tang, cardinalfish, cleaner shrimp, labroidei, eels, an isolated nesting area, all as vivid as they came.

_CONNOR IS AN AVID AQUARIIST._

“Nice fish,” HK800 told him.

“Which one?” came Connor’s voice from around the corner.

“How do you keep this setup going anyway?”

“Quarter tank water changes, mostly. It’s pretty self-sustaining at this point.”

HK800 decided to move on and look over the bookshelves. Connor kept a lot of old-style books, and one could find out a lot about a person’s personality by what books they kept around. Several psychology textbooks, thrillers, noir novels, self-help and inspiration books, marine biology textbooks, all of them made the small collection of Julie Garwood books stand out like a sore thumb. The _For the Roses_ series, huh? What made it so special that it got a place on this shelf?

He decided not to comment on it and glanced in the kitchen, where Connor currently had three bowls of Tupperware out, measuring out rice, vegetables, and chicken, and Sumo was practically on the counter.

“Sumo too good for kibble?” he attempted to joke.

“Do you know what’s in most commercial dog foods?” Connor replied. “This way I can make sure he gets what he needs without worrying too much about everything else.”

Connor set the bowl down and Sumo was on it with the same level of scrutiny that he had given the android, loosening his tie with one finger.

“I’m gonna go change, the scrap yard’s probably mud by now.”

“You been there before?”

“A few times. I used to buy up some scraps every once in a while, fix up what I can find and sell them off as refurbished.” Connor was already moving upstairs, and so HK800 was following him.

To be honest, he knew it was probably a bad idea, given his recent experiences, but Elijah wanted Markus back, and Connor wanted that hard drive. If he could figure out what happened with Markus, that might just be the lead that he needed.

Carl would _never_ put Markus in a state where he deviates from his programming for self-survival. Markus would _never_ hurt Carl. To him, it was that simple, even if his coworkers seemed to think otherwise.

HK800 decided to keep snooping around until he reached the upstairs bathroom, as white and angular as everything else in this apartment. In one of the cabinets was a first-aid kit. Without a single bit of hesitation, he opened it, remembering that technically, Connor had just proven to be prone to hurting himself in exchange for a good ending to his case.

It was no surprise that it seemed to be half-empty, and HK800 started looking through and ordering products. The ace bandage was disgusting and needed throwing away, the medical tape only had a few feet left, the band-aids looked like they were just about done for aside from the butterflies and the excessively large ones.

The vial of blue powder was a bit of a surprise, though. It didn’t look typical, so HK800 held it up to analyze the contents.

“Hey, Kamksi,” he drawled out slowly. “What are you doing with triptocaine?”

His voice called out from the bedroom. “It’s a TRI. Helps reduce symptoms of psychological trauma and reduces pain from serious injury. Why are you in my first aid kit?”

“If it’s muddy out there, you’re gonna wanna cover that cut. You got a script for this or what?”

“Nobody really prescribes that anymore after that one guy OD’ed in a hotel room like in 2012 and they started to do major studies on its dependency. Pack it up, we might need it.”

“Uh huh. You ain’t dependent on it, are you?”

Connor poked his head in, in a black T-shirt, leather jacket, and his jeans now. “I don’t think so? It works wonders when you use it for what it’s intended for.”

HK800 watched Connor’s face and when he was satisfied that there was no hint of lying, he pocketed the vial and followed the detective outside, surprised that Sumo seemed to be coming with them.


	6. The Seventh Circle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connor searches the scrap yard for any hint of his best chance at an actual lead, and gets more than he expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the length, and just a few warnings specific to the chapter:  
> PTSD is a tag for a good reason, as you already read, but Connor will be going through a full blown static shock in this chapter. If you are not familiar, it's an extremely serious and terrifying form of episode in many mental disorders where you essentially enter something akin to sleep paralysis, but you're wide awake and there is very little that can be done. They can last from seconds to hours.  
> As such, Connor is going to be using that tripto, but as I intend to have him use it only twice through this work, I didn't think that it qualified for a major Drug Use/Abuse tag, considering he's essentially self medicating. If I ever write the "bad" route for this fic, then I might have to consider it, but for now? No need.
> 
> So, I guess viewer discretion advised for this chapter? Sorry!

Just as Connor had predicted, the scrap yard was a slurry of mud, leaked thirium, and discarded androids, shut down or on their last legs. HK800 could see why Connor was a bit hesitant to come out here after changing his clothes. Just looking down from the street was enough of a shit show that any of Connor’s usual outfits were not likely to survive the ordeal.

Connor was busy working Sumo up for something, rubbing his ears and at his jowls and speaking to him in a slightly different pitch than his android was used to hearing out of his mouth. That in itself was interesting, but HK800 was far more interested in the circular piece that Sumo was almost stepping on. With a little bit of care, he picked it up to analyze it.

Not a single trace of thirium, but it was an LED nonetheless. Either one of the hundreds of androids underneath them was missing one, and the dump truck had missed their mark just a little bit beforehand, or there was a survivor that had managed to crawl out of the depths of hell and was back from the dead.

There didn’t seem to be any sign of thirium on the ground, but that could very well be attributed to the rain still falling and the storm from last night. It was funny how nature was always working against man in one way or another, he supposed, but today, it was just fucking annoying. Sure, HK800 would be fine, but Connor was very much human and the last thing he needed was for this damn brat to spend hours in all that filth, digging up god knows what while he didn’t notice he was getting soaked and lowering his immune system while there were risks of rust particles having already gone through that shallow cut right on his zygomaticus.

“Let’s get this over with,” HK800 told him, looking down. “You got an idea on how to get down there?”

“I usually just jump the barrier,” Connor replied. “It’s hard to see from this angle, but there ought to be a pile right down there to break the fall.”

Sumo’s nose was on the ground at this point, and Connor perked up. “You got something?” He reached out to unhook Sumo’s leash. “What’s there? Go get it!”

In a blur of white and brown fur, Sumo ducked under the barrier, his master not far behind him, vaulting over the barrier with all the skill that those ribbons on his desk had implied that he had. To his surprise, the sounds were clear that he even had gotten his footing when he landed and was sliding down relatively safely.

On an uneven, smooth, and mobile surface, it made it easy to imagine that he could jump over the hood of a car if he absolutely had to. However, the kid was thirty-two years old, not the sixteen-year-old who earned those ribbons and then opted to keep up on his training when he could.

HK800’s LED blinked yellow as he moved down the pile of android pieces, and for a second he thought he had a flicker of an unfamiliar emotion before he realized it was because Connor’s cell phone was ringing.

Without hesitation, as soon as he got down and checked to make sure that Connor was still running around like an idiot, he picked it up wirelessly.

“Detective Connor Kamski’s cell phone, this is his android.”

“What a coincidence, this is his boss.”

“Funny we should meet this way,” HK800 drawled, analyzing the mud the best he could with his processors focus on the call. “What’s up?”

“Is Kamski available?”

“He’s chasing the dog right now.”

“We just got a call in for a suspected deviant. I’ll just upload the directions to you if you can provide me your serial number.”

HK800 did just that, staring at a male model, chassis partially exposed, thirium still leaking from the exposed pump well. That was recent. That was very recent.

“Good. It doesn’t seem to be causing trouble yet, but you should still get him to check it out.” Pause. “He’s not working off the clock, is he?”

“I have no idea. Either we’re on a pleasure trip and he’s one of those guys who are into macabre entertainment, his brother sent him on a fetchquest, or he’s working. Wouldn’t be surprised if it’s all three, honestly, but good luck presenting this as evidence against us.”

“He’s still got seven and a half hours, and he can sum up a crime scene relatively quickly, but I’d still like him to work Saturday.”

“I’ll update his schedule. Thanks.”

“You too.”

HK800 dropped to his knees now that he had full control of his processors again to check the pump well. It was fully exposed, which made it easy to see where fingers have dug in a little too deep into the chassis. Even with the thirium still in his system, he must have shut down in mere minutes.

Given the rest of his damage, it didn’t take a psychologist to make the call this was likely the best thing that could have happened to a guy here. This didn’t take away from the evidence that someone, or something, was here recently, and this android had come across it.

Synthetic skin peeled away, and HK800’s hand was on the husk’s arm, trying to probe its memory.

 _RESTART REQUIRED_. Well, fuck. That wasn’t happening any time soon.

\---

As Sumo stopped to recatch the scent he was trailing, Connor took a moment to look around himself. If the trail somehow stopped here, then that likely meant so did Markus. He could see his android, the only apparent sign of life among these broken machines, stopped to talk to somebody, and his hand went straight for his pocket.

Which was empty.

His cell must have dropped from his pocket while they were in the cab. Or was somewhere in the mud. Dammit. He’d have to back track and try to find the thing.

With a heavy sigh, he started digging through the empty shells of what were once the best and brightest, most lifelike machines that Connor had ever seen Elijah sign his name to. It was kind of a waste. He was seeing perfectly healthy chassis with minimal damage that must have gotten thrown out due to simple issues if they had just taken them to CyberLife.

The innocent face of an AX400, staring at him but seeing nothing, was sending chills up his spine with an almost expert ease. Aside from…well, _her_ , the AX400 was something that Elijah had taken a lot of pride in to create, an easily affordable, pretty face with a skillset far beyond what it ought to have, including the ability to assess and store analyses of their owners’ emotions so that they can act according to their family’s very specific needs.

When his android had told him what happened, he referred to it as Kara. Kara’s face was the one staring back at him, her eyes full of emotions that he knew that she shouldn’t be able to feel.

What in the world happened, Kara? Why did you attack your owner and flee into the night with that YK500? Why wasn’t the YK500 reported missing?

If you were truly sorry, why in the _hell_ did you keep running, Kara?

Connor finally tore his eyes away from hers, that beautiful default model sky blue, and reached out to instinctively slide her lids shut. He didn’t need this right now. Kara was still on the loose, and who knew what she was going to get herself into while she searched for whatever it was that she felt she needed to find?

Maybe he needed to speak to Mr. Williams personally, just to clear some things up. That might finally put him on the right direction to figure out what triggered deviancy, at least hers.

Sumo barked, and it caught his attention enough to realize that he was ready to move forward, and was heading to the small, barely usable walkway between two large piles. A glance through it showed another clearly that Sumo was slipping through towards with zero difficulty. Of course, Connor was not going to let Sumo go too far, and it seemed that the scent of a person was stronger here than it had been through the rest of the scrap yard.

That was the funny thing about Saint Bernards. They had this lovely ability to catch a human’s scent under yards of snow and could be trained to dig them out and alert for help, but nobody seemed to think about the police use for such a breed when you aren’t sure what you are looking for. However, he had read the report. Markus had been found crouching over Carl. Leo admitted to pushing him. There would be a human scent on him, assuming that the rain hadn’t washed it all away by now. The hands that stuck out seemed to be dry, so of course the scent of a human would be strongest here.

With a deep breath, Connor turned to the side so that he could effectively squeeze through the opening and started to move. A dozen hands were touching his back, and he opted to ignore them as he was walking through. Sure, it felt like there were a ton of people touching his back, trying to grab a hold of him, but failing miserably against wet leather, but with as many hands protruding from the pile, it was not likely that any of it could be helped.

Once a hand gripped his leg at the ankle, however, he knew that it wasn’t his imagination, and now that he was still, he could feel the hands moving.

These were androids, not that different from Daniel, and they were still moving. One hand gripped over his arm, over his scar, as if it was some sort of mockery of his softer, more pliant flesh, and his mind went completely blank.

Connor couldn't get a scream out. Hell, he could barely breathe. He could feel his own heart racing a mile a minute behind his own skull, as if these hands had moved it for him. His legs went to jello, but he was still being held up. In fact, he swore he could feel hands reaching out further, grabbing his neck and squeezing, trying to pull him into the debris with them.

Fuck, all he could think about was what the androids in this pile were going to do to him if they managed to succeed in their goal, then his mind floated to what the deviants in the cases that he was investigating would end up doing. Daniel would kill him outright, his hands would be on his throat and squeezing until there was nothing left of his trachea, assuming he didn’t have a gun in his hand, where he would simply empty the clip on him for what he’s done. Ortiz’s android had every right to be angry enough to kill him, he was the one who had made sure that it was caught, and for all he knew it was on the way to CyberLife to be taken apart and analyzed. Kara, who knew what a woman on a mission was capable of, and android or not, Kara was a deviant and likely just as capable of anything and everything if it came down to protecting her YK500 “child.”

Connor's brain stopped working entirely, eyes wide but seeing absolutely nothing. Air was escaping his lungs, but it never felt like he was getting a breath back in. Another hand, this one was pulling to the side, and his body was just not able to comply.

\---

“Hands off, fuckers!” HK800 warned, his own hand trying to get a hold of Connor. Finally, he managed to get a hold of his elbow and started to pull, just to find Connor was as stiff as a fucking board.

Get it together, Kamski, it’s just a bunch of robots. HK800 already knew that he had been through things a million times worse than this. Right. If pulling wasn’t going to happen, then HK800 was just going to have to push him. Carefully, he slid in himself, taking a few experimental steps. Okay, he wasn’t too wide for this path, and he was a good deal stronger than the average human, so he just leaned his weight against Connor and shouldered him.

He didn’t react, not even a shout, and HK800 was quick to check his vitals. His breaths were deep and rapid, his heart rate was through the roof, and his body temperature had plummeted. Without worrying too much, he kicked the hand at his ankle roughly and shouldered him again. This time, he moved an inch. Okay, progress.

He tried a third time and the rest of the hands dislodged, forcing Connor forward despite his joints being hardly able to move themselves.

By the sixth shove, Connor and HK800 came spilling out from the crevice, HK800 not responding fast enough to get his weight back on his feet and falling forward, on top of Connor, who at the very least landed on his side and was easy to move on to his back once he managed to shift himself to his knees.

“Detective Kamski!”

HK800 moved so that he could get a better look at his eyes, a little surprised to find that Connor was staring right through him to the sky, still breathing erratically, heart still beating in his chest like it was trying to run a race.

“Kamski!” he tried again, forcing the detective to sit up, keeping a hold of him so that he didn’t risk him falling back to hit the mud again. “Kamski! Connor!”

He shook his shoulder gently, then rougher, trying to call out his name a few more times before he reached into his pocket and felt glass.

Right. Connor weighed about 179 lbs, and 26.85 of that was body fat. He’ll be quick to metabolize, but also quick to overdose if he tried to take more than he should. Moving to support Connor’s back with one side of his body, he carefully started to measure out the blue powder that Connor had warned him to bring in case of an emergency, trying to keep the rain off it. Once he was satisfied, he reached around him, putting the palm of his hand flush against the detective’s nose.

“Quit mouth breathing and snort this shit,” HK800 ordered, and to his surprise, it seemed to work, because Connor’s hand flew up to his wrist and he could feel the pressure of air moving over his hand.

It took a few seconds, but Connor leaned bonelessly against him, eyes finally coming back into focus as he panted heavily. In turn, his android went ahead and recapped the vial and slid it back into his coat pocket, moving so that Connor had a little more support.

Finally, both of Connor’s palms went to his head, the heels of his hands digging rudely into his eye sockets. “Oh, _fuck_ me…”

“I don’t think that this is the right time for that, Kamski. I can offer you some dirty talk though. Let’s start with your coat and work our way down.”

“That's _not what I mean_.”

“Well, maybe you should clarify next time. Come on, if you want a shower before you gotta go back to work, we need to get going.”

“I’m not leaving until I got that hard drive.”

“What the hell is on this hard drive that you want it for so bad? You got a job to do, Kamski, and running yourself literally to the ground is not going to get it done.”

Connor blew it off with a handwave and worked to get back on his feet. His knees still felt weak and the mud was working against him, but with HK800’s help, he managed to get himself back up to his feet and continue back on the search for where Sumo had run off to.

He found the hound sniffing a nondescript pile of androids, and Connor, finally back to Earth, started to dig through. His android was following suit, but after getting through layer upon layer of deactivated androids, the detective finally gave in to the need to sneeze.

“You cold?”

“I’ll be fine,” Connor dismissed, pulling another android out to look over the features. “Markus had to be here, Sumo is usually good at identifying smells and he’s stopped here.”

“Well, clearly he’s not now. Maybe someone else decided to snap him up for scrap or something.”

Connor paused, and a feeling of dread was starting to seep into his bones, underneath the rain and underneath the chill. “If they did, we need to figure out who it was. Elijah left something in there that he insists needs to not fall into the wrong hands.”

“So that’s why you’re so focused on this.”

“…He’s an asshole, but he _is_ my brother. Besides, if I can get that hard drive, maybe I can figure out what really happened to Carl…”

“You’re too focused on this one case, detective. If you’re willing to take a suggestion, why don’t you distance yourself from it for a little while. We got another case we need to get to before a potential deviant flies the coop anyway.” HK800 raked his eyes over Connor’s body, how his clothes were covered in mud and clinging to every curve that left Connor feeling entirely naked when he turned his head to talk to him. “Plus, you need new clothes anyway. Nobody’s going to take you seriously caked in mud and hair frizzing.”

Connor defensively put a hand over the top of his head and whistled for Sumo, and the three headed out a different way. He wasn’t going through that wall of hands a second time.

HK800 couldn’t blame him, and for the second time today, dismissed a software error that popped up in the corner of his vision so that he could keep a better eye on the human that was looking less human and more like a drowned rat.


	7. The Nest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Do you like birds, Detective?”  
> “I don’t mind them, why?”  
> “It’s just that they look like they cause a huge mess. Given your apartment’s state, I was expecting a little bit more of a reaction.”

One shower, a change of clothes, and a located missing phone later, Connor found himself on an elevator to a building that looked like it oughtn’t have any inhabitants in it, much less multiple.

HK800 was leaning against the back of it, hands resting on the railing with his ankles crossed. He was already checking Connor’s vitals. It seemed like the triptocaine had already worked its way through his system, and the detective seemed to be back to normal. That was good.

They stepped out of the elevator to the allegedly abandoned floor, and the first thing Connor noticed was the sheer amount of disrepair in the hallway. “I’m gonna need another shower after this…”

“I know this floor’s not being used right now, but they could at least clean up the place.”

Connor checked the number on the apartment before knocking on the door. “Detroit Police, open up!”

Silence was not necessarily a confession that there was something going wrong, so Connor tried again before he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“Stay behind me.”

Connor turned his head and frowned a little. “I have a gun, you’re not allowed to handle them, let me –”

Too late. HK800 already had his foot against the door, sending it open with a satisfying crack. Connor took point after that, gun at ready as he made a quick sweep of the entrance hall and the two rooms ahead of them before he decided to kick the third door open.

Feathers flew everywhere, wings flapping close enough to his face to make Connor shrink back in sheer surprise and right against HK800’s chest. What the fuck?

He took a moment to regain composure. Pigeons. Wall-to-wall pigeons. Who the hell had that many birds in their apartment?

“…Well, I see that the investigation has run afowl,” Connor recovered.

“You’re not funny, Detective,” HK800 informed him, bending down to check the fallen birdcage.

“That’s a shame,” Connor told him, heading toward the kitchen in the back, “I’m being pigeonholed by my own android.”

“Not any funnier the second time around.”

Connor opened the fridge to find it completely empty. It didn’t look like whoever was keeping their own personal flock was one to eat. There seemed to be birdseed on the kitchen counter, though, so there was that.

“Detective, can you come look at this?” HK800 called, and that was about when Connor had realized that his android had left the living room.

He cleared the space in between relatively quickly, and the first thing he saw was the fresh thirium in the sink, an LED being held between the android’s forefinger and thumb.

“Looks like we got a deviant after all.”

“They’re removing their LEDs now?” Connor griped. This was only going to make the investigation harder. They could be passing deviants on the street and think they were normal people. And, hell, they probably knew that.

HK800’s eyes went toward the wall. “What do you make of the chicken scratch?”

Did…did it make a pun right back at him? A good one, at that? The audacity of the damn android.

Connor turned his head to see what he was talking about. rA9, scrawled countless times, obsessively and without control. At least this time it was in Sharpie.

“rA9? I saw it scrawled in the bathroom during the Ortiz case, but I haven’t figured out what it means yet…Go ahead and add it to the database, it might make it easier to isolate in programming later.”

HK800’s LED blinked a few times, then he went ahead and pulled his hair back into a much messier ponytail than he had come with. That suited him much better, and suddenly, Connor was very much aware of their close proximity.

God, he needed to get laid, soon. Maybe a trip to the Eden Club on the way back wouldn’t be a bad idea.

It wasn’t until those steel blue eyes of his were looking right back at him, an eyebrow raised, that Connor realized he had been staring, and the tips of his ears went red in embarrassment.

“I don’t think that we’re going to find anything else in here.” He carefully sidestepped him, heading back to the living room when the large poster caught his attention. Why was the corner folded down that way?

Within ten seconds, he had crossed the floor with its mass of birds and carefully peeled it away to reveal the crack in the dry wall. Interesting. This didn’t look like it was caused by the general ruin of this building.

He reached in the pull out the leather-bound book that was laying so innocently in there and started to flip the pages. Mazes, carefully designed mazes.

“Do you like birds, Detective?”

Connor kept his attention on the pages, trying to figure out a rhyme or reason to these perfectly formed, uniform lines. “I don’t mind them, why?”

“It’s just that they look like they cause a huge mess. Given your apartment’s state, I was expecting a little bit more of a reaction.”

“Phil’s created a whole line of wildlife androids. I hear from Danielle that they’re working on a zoo of extinct animals as well, so I bet if I really wanted to, I could get some domesticated ones, but I have Sumo and the fish.” Connor shrugged.

“Just a bit of a surprise. You find something?”

“It looks like a diary, but I can’t read it.” Connor handed it over, letting HK800 look it over.

The android stared at it, as if fascinated, but he finally looked back up. “It’s encrypted. Without the key, it might take me a bit of time to decode.”

“That’s fine, I’m not in any rush,” Connor said, heading toward the birdcage. It looked like at some point, it had been attached to the ceiling.

Which had a hole in it. Interesting.

With a glance to HK800, who nodded back, Connor stepped away, unholstering his gun again, aiming it toward the hole that his android was currently moving to look into.

Unceremoniously, HK800 fell back, birds flew everywhere, and Connor barely caught a flick of color moving among the grey while he was swatting the pigeons away. “After it!”

Without any question or hesitation, HK800 was back on his feet and moving, Connor close on his trail until they burst through the fire exit, where he halted. Thankfully, his android did not, putting one foot on the railing and leaping forward with no hesitation.

No. Connor was a bit careless, but he did not have a death wish. He was going to follow street side and avoid thinking about the fact his android was now running on roofs, a hair’s breadth away from falling and being damaged, one step closer to a gruesome end, one step to being another Daniel.

It only took him a minute or so to go down the fire exit and land safely in the alleyway, and then he booked it. HK800 was faster than him, but he knew that for short-term sprints, he was faster than an android not specifically designed to flee the scene.

He ran past pedestrians, not bothering to apologize, glancing upward at the two dots that were making their way across multiple roofs with almost minimal effort.

Technology was fucking amazing.

\---

Why the hell did they always insist on fucking running?! If you were going to stick around a scene, the least you could damn well do was turn yourself in when you got caught!

HK800 vaulted himself over a flat of vegetables, already frustrated that he could not go as fast as his human and felt like he was not gaining any ground on this goddamned deviant. He was designed to be faster and stronger, but whoever did his programming must not have accounted for the fact that he was being designed for some bastard that was probably still capable of clearing 500 meters at a minute and fifteen seconds if he had to. If they got the option, HK800 was going to ask for an upgrade to fix that.

Thankfully, there looked to be a higher-level roof in front of them. The deviant wasn’t going to go much further.

There was moment’s hesitation, but it looked behind him and realized the HK800 was closing in, and that was all she wrote for that suspect.

Hank stopped himself at the edge, hands going to the barrier, and looking over to check the damage. Connor was down there already, looking like he just got the shock of his damn life.

“Holy shit,” HK800 muttered, then raised his voice level so that Connor could hear. “Are you okay?”

He glanced up, then waved. Okay, good.

“I’m on my way down, don’t go anywhere!”

He found the stairs and headed down, seeing Connor already calling it in.

“—just _jumped_ ,” he explained. “I don’t know, maybe he thought he could reach the window!”

HK800 glanced down to Connor’s pantleg. Part of the thirium spray from the landing seemed to have gotten on him. He had to have beaten them there. Bastard could fucking _move_ if he had to.

“Please come collect it, I want to check its memory before it’s shipped off to CyberLife for further analysis.”

HK800 put an arm around Connor after the phone call was over, guiding him away from the suicide scene.

“I’ll be faster next time,” he told him.

This time, Connor leaned his head to the side, soundly against his shoulder. “Not your fault. Let’s get out of here, I’ve had enough dead androids for today.”

…Wait. _Dead_?


	8. Love Games

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You know, if your theory’s correct about what’s triggering deviants, this place is practically a breeding ground, so unless getting murdered is what turns you on, I’d suggest you pick a safer option.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize in advance for the semi-rushed chapter! If it helps any, think of it as the Russian Roulette chapter and we're skipping over to Markus getting some spare parts, and the actual Eden Club chapter has yet to begin. If I didn't break it apart, then this chapter was going to be ridiculously long.

Even in broad daylight, it was dark as hell inside. That had stopped surprising him by now, though.

If receiving his HK800 was like a kid at Christmas, then being here in the middle of the day had Connor feeling like a kid in a candy store. There was a little bit of something for everybody here. Redheads, Asians, blondes, breasts, dicks, chocolate, vanilla, everything.

Connor didn’t even know where he wanted to start, much less where he wanted to finish. His eyes drifted over the Amazonian goddess at the entrance, dark skin showing the glitter off better than the rest, her legs just a fraction of an inch longer than the rest, and he could practically see them on his shoulders. Then his eyes traveled to the next case, the handsome Asian with just the smile of a K-Pop star, towering over him by several inches, he would not mind in the least bending that pretty boy over and…

“I know it’s your off time, but can you not drool over every single one of them you pass? Don’t you have a type?”

Oh. Right. HK800. Part of the reason Connor wasn’t thinking straight right now. Between the broken gardener and the way it had pulled its hair back, Connor’s mind was frazzled, somewhere between perplexed, horrified, and unnecessarily aroused. For Connor, this tended to result in some of his less than savory decisions in the past, and today it was not going to be an exception.

Connor bit his lower lip. If he didn’t know any better, he’d think his partner was a little bit jealous.

“That’s the beauty of it, once I get to one of the rooms they’ll be able to adapt to whatever that type is going to be, I just gotta choose a flavor.”

“You’re disgusting, Kamski.”

“No, I’m having a bad day and need to relax, and this is a good place to do it.”

“You know, if your theory’s correct about what’s triggering deviants, this place is practically a breeding ground, so unless getting murdered is what turns you on, I’d suggest you pick a safer option.”

“Like you?” Connor teased, head tilted slightly, eyes shifting to the side to watch his face.

While his face stayed as stoic as ever, he saw the flash of yellow underneath his bangs and Connor couldn’t help the smirk on his face.

“Tell you what, you can pick one out and I’ll get the case open for you. No reason I get to have all the fun and leave you waiting around.” Connor moved inside to watch the female on the pole for a while. Oh, she was beautiful too…

“It figures that the first time I see you in a good mood all day is at a whore house,” HK800 told him. “I’ll pass.”

“Not true, getting you unboxed has been by far the highlight of this shitty day. The HR400 and WR400 are state of the art for pleasure, you were built with the investigation in mind. It’s no offense to you, I just haven’t cracked you yet to see exactly what you’re capable of. Besides, thirty minutes with something that gets reset regularly is a lot lower a risk than you going deviant and having access to me 24/7.”

“I don’t know you well enough yet to make the decision that I want to kill you.”

“You’re really not helping. If I didn’t know you weren’t capable of it, I’d think you’re jealous.” Connor moved to the next stage, where a well-built HR400 was dancing.

“I’m not jealous, but somebody here has gotta be the one to think with the head attached to their neck and that ain’t you right now.”

“Sorry, just give me thirty minutes and I’ll have my head back in the game.” His eyes raked over a blue-haired Traci, she was one he was quite familiar with, and the bedroom eyes she was making behind the glass begged for him to come hither, and so the siren call was answered, and his hand was over the scanner.

“…Thirty minutes. I’m counting.”

It smiled at him and guided him to a room as the HK800 settled against the wall, closing his eyes. Was he really starting the internal timer?

Connor shook his head, heading to the console once he was in, immediately setting up the scene. He wanted a blue background, and he wanted a romantic fantasy, one with a long-standing lover, and within moments, he felt arms around him, breasts pressed against his back.

“I missed you,” she muttered into his ear.

“Sorry, Traci, it’s just been a long day,” he replied, turning around to kiss her neck, and she gently tugged on his tie, guiding him towards the bed.

“Why don’t you come here and tell Mommy all about it?”

His back hit the mattress, and his head was already swimming as he felt his tie come undone, and so did his lips. After all, in a few hours, none of what he said was going to matter, her memory would be wiped clean, and it let him indulge in the fantasy he was looking for. “Hell, I don’t know where to start. The murder case from last night kept me up, and then I fell asleep at my desk, I got a lecture from Fowler because I was working too hard, apparently…” He shrugged out of his button down, hands going to that skimpy top they put the girls in, and once it was past her lips, he was kissing her hard, with all the frustration that has been pinning him to the fucking wall.

When he pulled back for air, Traci muttered reassurances, and Connor fell into complete complacency, at least, until one thing that might have been otherwise innocent caught his attention.

“Reed isn’t bothering you, is he?”

Connor stiffened a bit, blinking up at her. “Traci?”

Her LED went yellow, bending forward, her hands sliding from his chest over his shoulders and to the cool fabric of the sheets, looking a little confused. “Yes…?”

“How do you remember Reed’s been bothering me?”

The next few seconds went by in a blur, her LED blinking red and her legs tightening around his torso, keeping him pinned while he felt the fabric of his tie going across his neck, tighter and tighter. He gripped her shoulders and rolled her over, struggling to catch his breath as she tucked her knees under his body to push him off.

Connor reached for his belt holster to find his gun was gone, and it wasn’t until he heard the click of the safety going off that he realized just where it went. Instinctively, his hands went into the air, and he slowly stood up.

“Connor, I _really_ don’t want to hurt you…you’ve never…”

Her LED was still blinking red, so Connor wasn’t so sure about that, but staring down the barrel of a gun was going to make anyone compliant, at least, until the gun went away.

“It’s okay, Traci, I’m not going to hurt you, either. Just _talk_ to me.”

She kept her unsteady hands trained on to him, keeping her distance.

“What’s it going to take to make sure nobody gets hurt?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note to Connor: Listen to Hank next time and maybe you won't get a hostage simulation instead.


	9. The Eden Club

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> HK800 can't let Connor out of his sight for two minutes and now he has a solid Exhibit B.

The situation seemed to have deescalated, for now at least.

Traci was sitting on the bed beside him, gun still in her hand, but at least she seemed to be willing to talk about it. Being deviant, that is, being aware of every single thing that had been done to her that she had to hide and how she hated every minute of it.

It made Connor acutely aware that even if you never did a thing to them, memories still remained, and there was little that a person could do to stop a deviant’s errors from creating situations where it is kill or be killed. He was aware that he was only alive because even in her fear of being caught, Traci knew that once she pulled that trigger, that would be her death.

In this exact moment, she wasn’t an it, she wasn’t just a machine that was suffering from error after error, causing her processor to malfunction and leaving her nothing to go off of but little bits of script. He remembered back in college how Professor Stern had warned him that a human brain was very similar to a computer as it was, that mental disorders could simply be explained the same way as a virus or how a code was input incorrectly, causing a fatal error. Back then, he had always considered it something akin to how he could describe Elijah: a simple coding error, where humans were simply too complicated to read at the level that he was capable of, so he chose to reject more than simple interactions.

Here, though, it seemed to be the exact opposite. An overwhelmed processor, once capable of performing a variety of tasks so long as the base script was similar, trying to come to terms that everything was overly complex and struggling to comprehend the garbled information, running through broken code just as indiscriminately as the rest of it.

More importantly, she could _feel_ everything. He may not have done anything in his regular visits to mark himself as much of a threat, but that didn’t change the fact that she _felt_ the shame of going to bed with a man, that she feared for her very existence underneath it all, that it gave her the _drive_ to keep carrying on the masquerade and she _felt_ that she’d be doing so until the day that someone forced her into action.

He knew that she couldn’t feel anything but the pressure against her, maybe register the heat of his body, but he still felt the need to pull her close, a hand on her grip to keep the gun in place every time that she glanced down at it, LED still a red ring of death with some major hang time. Negotiation Mode had been activated a while ago, and right now the priority was to make sure that they both were walking out of this room, alive.

“You need to think this through,” Connor told her. “If you are serious about wanting to get out of there, where would you even end up going? There’s nowhere safe for deviants to go.”

“That’s not true,” Traci insisted. “There _is_ a place. I just…don’t know how we’d get there from here.”

“Where do you think that you’re gonna go, then?”

“There’s this place called Jericho.” Traci’s whole body paused, as if she suffered a lag just from mentioning it. “Taxi. If you want to get out of here, I want a taxi.”

“I can’t do that, Traci,” Connor reminded. “Just like you, there are certain things that I cannot do as an officer, and one of them is explicitly making it easy for you to disappear after you’ve pulled a gun on me. Let’s try again, okay?”

“No, I want ten minutes to get ready and I want a taxi.” Her LED went yellow, processing a little more information. “And I want your shirt.”

Connor blinked a few times, head tilting slightly. “My shirt?”

Her hand shifted, and he immediately drew back, his hands leaving her shoulders to go level to his shoulders. “Okay. I’m going to grab it.”

Connor stood up slowly, and Traci didn’t say a word as he leaned over the bed to take his discarded shirt and drop it into her lap. It seemed like a simple request, in the grand scheme of things, a change of clothes was one of the most common things that was asked for in a hostage situation, and it typically didn’t take too long to obtain and record them as evidence. It was just the first time he was being told to give it off his back.

Traci stood up, reaching for the black piece of silk fabric that had fallen to the floor before turning the gun back on to him, and his hands went back into position.

“On your knees, Connor. Please.” She used his gun to gesture toward the head of the bed.

Connor kept moving slowly, not turning away from her as he sunk to his knees beside it, looking back up at her as she approached him, using the hand she had his tie in to gather both of his hands, bringing them behind his back. Within thirty seconds, he felt the pressure of strong knots, his back bending backward to accommodate where he was being anchored to (he assumed that it was leg of the bed, but he couldn’t turn his head to confirm it properly, given the barrel of the gun itself had buried itself right at his breastbone), and then Traci was moving away, placing the gun far out of his reach as she went to throw her arms into his shirt and start working on the buttons from bottom up.

It finally occurred to him just how small she was in comparison to him. The hemline was hitting the tops of her thighs, she rolled his sleeves up her forearms and still had to cuff them in the end to make sure this looked to be intentional design. The way she was turning in the mirror and checking her appearance was making it all the worse, scrutinizing her appearance to make sure that she was not going to be too out of place as an android.

“Traci, I’m not going to…” Connor tried again, trying to remind her that she was still acting irrationally.

His voice died as she turned to face him with what appeared to be a sweet smile, just like a girlfriend who had liberated his shirt for the morning. “Ten minutes.”

A lot could happen in ten minutes, he knew that much from experience, but he still found himself nodding as she headed back for the bed, his gun tucked into her hot pants and disappearing under the shapeless fabric before she slipped out the door.

\---

The door opened up far too soon, and HK800 opened his eyes in response to it, watching the Traci saunter out wearing nothing but a pair of high heels and Connor’s shirt.

Briefly, they made eye contact, and his own eyebrows lifted in silent question at her. Sure, she probably wore that shirt a little better than Connor, but that didn’t mean that he wasn’t going to notice that there was no Connor following her out of the room.

“He’ll be out in a few minutes,” the Traci answered him, not bothering to wait for him to ask the question on his lips. “He’s yours, right?”

“That’s a weird way to put it,” HK800 replied. “But I _am_ a custom designed android that’s was built specifically for him, if that’s what you’re trying to ask.”

“If he’s not out in ten minutes, can you go get him? I don’t want him to go over on his time limit.”

“Then why do you have his shirt?”

“I’m just delivering it to the back,” she told him. “He’ll know why, he can pick it up tomorrow.”

There was another warning, another error message about his software going instable as HK800 tried to push back the implications that hung heavily between her words and his shirt on her body. This was ridiculous, and it was disgusting. There were much better uses of their time than waiting for Connor to get his rocks off to some android doing whatever it was that he was in the mood for.

“Well, I hope you had fun messing around with him, then,” he replied, not caring if his tone was sincere or not, and her LED went through a quick yellow cycle before she offered a sly little smile.

“So that’s why you said no.”

“You’re reading it all wrong, I’m not programmed for that shit,” he said, moving away from the wall. “Go do what you gotta do, I’ll make sure he gets out of your room before time rolls over.”

“Thank you, I appreciate it,” she replied, turning around to head further inside the club. “None of us are, you know.”

The only way that HK800 might be able to describe his reaction was that there was a hiccup in his programming. Something about the way that she said it made it very clear that there was something not exactly right about what she had to say and the way that she said it. Suddenly, he became very aware of every little detail in the exchange. Nobody was programmed for what? Why was she wearing Connor’s shirt? Why wasn’t Connor coming out with her?

He felt like he only took a single step toward the door that Connor was still behind, even if he knew that it was more around ten or twenty steps from where he had been standing. Without a modicum of hesitation, he opened the door to watch Connor squirming against the bed, naked from the waist up.

Well, shit. That confirmed his suspicion about this place being a breeding ground for deviants, and now he was presented with the option of risking losing their suspect to help Connor out or leave him where he couldn’t cause any more trouble than he already has and chase after her.

One quick scan of the club confirming there was at least one known sex offender here, and the risk of Connor being caught unable to help himself out of the situation if that criminal just so happened to stumble upon him and decided to save himself thirty dollars presenting itself later, HK800 opted to take the risk and moved quickly into the room, dropping to his knees beside Connor, hands working on the tight knots of what clearly used to be his tie. No amount of steaming it was going to get it back to its former glory.

“What the _hell_ did I tell you before you went in here?” he chastised. “Can’t you fucking listen to me just _once_ in your life?”

“Now is _so_ not the time for this,” Connor retorted, twisting, testing, pulling. “She’s armed, if we’re gonna catch her we’re gonna have to be careful.”

“The fuck do you mean ‘she’s armed’?” HK800 glanced down to his holster and answered his own question. “Dammit. What kind of kinky shit did you guys get up to?”

“Can you just untie me?!” Connor snapped back. “She’s getting away!”

HK800 pulled one last time on the tie before realizing that whatever bondage protocols she had in her must have been overridden, because she used double square knots and he wasn’t getting out of this situation easily. “Don’t move.”

\---

Connor obeyed, stilling himself just as the smell of burning silk hit his nose and he visibly winced. He liked that tie, it was his favorite, and he was going to miss it.

However, in a few seconds, he felt the pressure relieve itself and he scrambled to his feet, stepped over his hands, and started to work the remaining knot with his teeth. Burned silk tasted just as horrible as the smell, but thankfully, HK800 was already on his feet and heading in the direction he had seen the Traci walk in.

By time they reached the red room, though, she was nowhere to be seen. HK800 checked the occupied rooms, and Connor pushed through to the employees only hallway, hesitating at the door.

She could be waiting on the other side, not trusting that he would give her the ten minutes that she asked for, and the second he went through might be another trip to the hospital, or even worse.

HK800 put his hand on his shoulder again, somehow already finished checking the unoccupied rooms, and gently pulled him behind him, opening the door himself.

It looked to be a storage room of sorts, extra Tracis were lined up at the walls, the washing machine against the wall and, sure enough, the warehouse door was wide open, presenting the back alley and the light drizzle that has returned.

Without missing a beat, the HK800 was crossing the length of the room and glancing outside. The deviant couldn’t have gone far. She wouldn’t have had time to climb that fence.

“It’s still here.”

Connor nodded, starting to look around. His shirt was nowhere to be found, and there were several empty hangers on the rack not too far away. Near the warehouse door was the simple, familiar warning, rA9, on the brick. It looked old, but she did say that she’s been this way for months now. What was it like, hiding in plain sight this way, going back through the motions like there was nothing wrong?

In a way, he supposed he could relate to the struggle. His left hand reached up to touch the brick, a silent reminder that months of physical therapy had not even been enough to fully return feeling to his fingertips. Running his fingers over the brick announced that it was bumpy, but the roughness felt completely gone, nothing registering that it might hurt if he pushed down harder and repeated the action.

He snapped out of it when he heard his android shout, “Don’t move!” and then a gunshot. Shit, was he okay?!

He turned his head and was relieved to see that the bullet seemed to hit the ceiling, but there looked to be another deviant pulling him off the first, and Connor quickly moved to back him up.

The redhead was looking pissed, turning her attention to Connor, pushing him right back, away from the Traci and HK800 struggling against each other. Out of instinct, he started pushing back, trying to get her against the wall, but she countered his momentum, sending them both over a biocomponent chest and him sprawling on the floor underneath her.

He barely dodged her hand trying to come down on his body when he noticed that there was something shiny in her hand. It nearly came down on him again, but he caught her wrist and tried to see what she was pushing down toward him. A Phillips head screwdriver. Well, wasn’t that fucking great? He was already starting to sweat as it was, his hands felt slippery, and one slip was all it would take for that pressure she was putting on him to come down into his torso.

Thankfully, he managed to get his other hand up to push her backward, using his leg to avoid a stiletto to his junk as he scrambled to his feet again. It was just the distraction she needed, because he saw her arm arc out just a fraction too late and pain blossomed over his chest, from collarbone to collarbone. He stalled for a second, but managed to avoid her arm coming down again, and he had her in an arm lock long enough to catch HK800 chasing the blue-haired Traci across the floor before he felt the back of her head slam roughly into his nose, making him recoil.

The sound of metal clattering against cement was a welcome one, even with his ears ringing the way they were.

He barely registered the sound of talking, but a familiar voice was shouting his name and it made him turn his head.

What the hell was Chris doing here, and more importantly, why was there the blur of a brown jacket moving to shoulder check the redheaded Traci that was pushing him against the gurney in the center of the room?

Oh, right. Shit. Fuck. He needed to make a decision _fast_.

Connor moved on to the owner of said brown jacket’s back, wrestling the gun that he was drawing, and the redhead took the struggle among detectives as time to catch them both off balance, sending them both to the ground.

“Don’t shoot, Chris, I want them both alive!” Connor pleaded from where he landed.

HK800 was now dealing with two deviants, throwing him over the sudden stop and into the rain.

“What the _fuck_ ,” Gavin cursed, gripping Connor’s hair to slam it against the floor, sending stars exploding behind the younger detective’s eyes and claiming his gun back. “Give me that!”

He was on his feet faster than Connor, heading toward the exit as Chris helped Connor sit up.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, but if Gavin shoots my android trying to get those two, he’s paying for the repairs!” Connor pointedly directed his voice over toward the warehouse entrance, but, well, it wasn’t any surprise that Gavin fired anyway.

A quick glance revealed that HK800 didn’t have a bullet hole, but there was bright, electric blue leaking down the nape of his neck, on to his shirt and jacket and mixed with his hair, and the chaos that went with a third shot and Gavin letting out a feral, wordless shout was just enough for the pair to get over the fence and out of range.

Connor moved straight toward Gavin first, noting that HK800 was able to get up from where he had slid against the brick wall on his own, carefully moving the hand clutching his shoulder, blood dripping from between his fingers.

“It’s a good thing you like leather,” Connor breathed, taking the edge of the jacket and carefully pulling it away until the fabric was loose, repeating the process with his hoodie, then his t-shirt. “And a lot of layers.”

Gavin pushed Connor back the second he heard the bullet move to the floor. “What the fuck were you doing here, Connor?!”

“Same thing I suspect you were,” Connor told him. “The response time makes sense for Chris to get here from patrol, but you should have been at the station!”

“It doesn’t matter what I was doing in the area, but if you gotta know I was on dinner break!” His bloodied hand flew violently past Connor’s shoulder, his finger pointing accusingly at the HK800 that was walking back to the police. “You got your own damn android to fuck, why were you fucking a rental!?”

HK800 grabbed Connor by his arm before he could protest, pulling him away as Chris did the same to Gavin. “Sorry, I didn’t think that the first responder was going to be him.”

Connor just shook his head. “Let’s just go and get the paperwork filled out. Thanks for helping anyway, Gavin.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome, but next time that bullet’s gonna be for you, you fucking hear me?”

“Calm down, Detective Reed,” Chris tried, wrestling with the radio to see if they could get a medic. “This could’ve been anybody.”

HK800 looked over Connor as they headed out the back way as well, lifting the detective so that he didn’t have as much to climb and went ahead to process a taxi.

Neither of them said a word until they got in. Connor caught sight of himself in the rearview mirror, blood going down his nose and a shallow scratch over his bare chest. He looked a fucking mess, and he was going to regret going to work in the morning unless Gavin managed to calm down.

“You alright?” HK800 asked.

Connor turned his head to look at him, and HK800 was definitely a him right now in Connor’s mind, and his hand went up to touch the back of his head, pulling it back to check the thirium over his fingertips. He was bleeding pretty heavily.

“…Yeah, it’s just a scratch, I barely feel it. Let me check your head.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternative reaction to Connor's predicament:  
> HK800: Hey, Kamski, while you're down there...  
> Connor: ....  
> Relationship: ∨∨∨


	10. A Long Drive Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m not a deviant, Kamski. If I was, I’d have already taken control of this situation."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do apologize for the wait on this one! I've had a bit of computer issues. To make it up to you, expect four days of back to back chapters.
> 
> Follow me at @hartigan_nancy for updates on my fics in the future!

“You haven’t eaten all day, Kamski.”

“I told you, I’m fine.”

“When was the last time you didn’t drink any calories?”

“Lunch, wasn’t it?”

“…No, Kamski, your lunch hour was spent digging around a junk yard and you had a Monster on the way. By the way, twice the amount of caffeine you’re recommended, get your shit together.”

Connor looked across the cab at his android. After they spent a good few hours filling out paperwork down at the station curtesy of Gavin, they had shifted so that Connor’s back was against the window, his long legs elevated to drape across HK800’s lap. Thankfully, the wounds on HK800 had already been repaired, and the thirium in his hair had evaporated into dark grey clumps. Still, there was no way that today could have possibly gone any worse. First, the ultimatum from Fowler, then Kara, then the scrapyard fiasco, and now, he had just spent hours filling out a report because it just so happened to turn out that the cute android that he happened to frequent not only went deviant but had memories of all their encounters. The amount of confidential information that she had run off with could only spell disaster for the entire precinct, not to mention the investigation. Now, he was being lectured by his own damn android.

“You’re not my dad, can you stop acting like you are? Jeez.”

“Don’t get pissed off at me just because you want to let yourself fall apart, Kamski. You’re the one who programmed me to make sure that you keep up your damn lifestyle, and I kind of took that as implying you have to _live_ long enough for me to do that.”

“Don’t start on that,” Connor told him.

HK800 seemed to let it go, and Connor took that as a sign that he had won this round, so pulled out his phone to check for any messages. Somehow, he had gotten logged out of his Blendr account. A few tries trying to log back in made him give up and send a forgotten password email. Then he blinked at the alert that the email wasn’t connected to any account.

“What the fuck…?”

HK800 looked over, watching Connor’s face go from frustration, to confusion, to annoyance. “Everything alright?”

“Do you know what happened to my Blendr account?”

“Got rid of it.”

Connor’s eyes moved from the screen to the HK800’s face. “Are you fucking serious?!”

“Hey, if you made it pretty clear through your actions that you’d rather fuck an android and pay than a proverbial asshole human who is only out for your literal one for free, so I decided to do you a favor and eliminate a distraction.”

The incredulous look on Connor’s face was worth having to dodge the phone and catch it before it went out the open window.

“What, I can’t go to Eden Club and I can’t try to meet other people to try to find somebody? Can’t you make up your mind?”

“Yeah, about that, shouldn’t you do it first, Detective?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t play dumb, Kamski, I know you were helping those girls get out of there. If Gavin asked you the right questions and backed you into a corner where you couldn’t get your bullshit politician’s answers then he could have done what he wanted and put you behind bars.”

Connor wasn’t sure what to say there, so HK800 pressed on.

“I’ve been reading your notes, Kamski. I’ve found what you actually think is going on. Don’t you think I can be trusted with the information that you’re thinking your brother made a mistake in the initial code and now you’re trying to cover up his mess? Isn’t that why you need Markus’ hard drive so fucking badly?

Connor shook his head a little, leaning back and looking out the rear windshield. “You’re wrong.”

“I’m right. Your relationship is tense at best from what I can gather, and now suddenly you two are agreeing on something. You didn’t program me to be stupid, Kamski, and I doubt that Fowler is stupid enough to buy whatever lie you’re gonna try to sell him later.”

“I said ‘you’re wrong,’ so shut up!” Connor knew his voice was escalating, but he didn’t care. Emotions were running high, and he didn’t need this, not right now.

Unfortunately, he remembered that he had the order override installed, and HK800 could yell at him right back. “If you think that your brother is the cause of all this and you start hiding evidence, don’t you think that makes you just as guilty as he is for all this, Kamski? If those girls cause any more trouble, that’s going to be on you, because you chose to stop your own fucking teammates from stopping them! You’re smart as hell, so use your goddamn head for a minute!”

Connor stared back, jaw clenched, and didn’t think twice about reaching for the loaner pistol that he had picked up while they were at the station and aiming it carefully. If he fired, then it would go through the android’s head and slow its trajectory enough to go out the window and not hit anybody further.

“I told you that you’re wrong.” He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself.

Unfortunately, the android merely looked down the barrel of the gun and then glance up into his eyes. “You’re not going to do it, Connor. Put that thing away before you hurt yourself more than you already have been today.”

“I’m the one giving the orders here. So, tell me. Did you go deviant yourself and aren’t telling me?”

“If I was a deviant why the fuck would I tell you?” He stared for a second, noticing that wasn’t working, so decided to switch his tactic. “I’m not a deviant, Kamski. If I was, I’d have already taken control of this situation. I’m not acting out of my programming, but I can tell you that from your notes, I’m not ‘scared’ of you and that gun. What ‘scares’ the hell out of me is that you’re going to end up dead in a ditch somewhere if I don’t keep acting like your dad, be it from a mission gone wrong, neglecting yourself, or you go out with the right person and those pretty words that you use just for criminals won’t get you out of it. Statistically speaking, you're _going to_ meet one someday.”

The silence fell heavy, filled only with the sound of a city night surrounding them. It did nothing to comfort Connor right now, and instead, he just kept his eyes locked on to the HK800’s.

Finally, the android broke the silence. “Plus, your safety’s on.”

He slipped the gun back to his holster with a frustrated noise, sinking back into the seat just in time for them to roll up to his apartment.

“…I’m sorry, I…”

“You’re tired. Try to get some sleep tonight.”

Connor stared for a little while longer. In the moonlight, if it weren’t for the soft blue light that peeked from his bangs, the glow from the armband on that raggedy jacket...HK800 could pass off as a human, that was for sure, one who was watching for any microexpression on Connor’s face.

He shook his head, grabbing the handle and swinging his legs around.

Silent as a ghost, his android followed as they crossed through the threshold, Sumo coming to greet them.

Connor headed straight upstairs, undoing his tie and getting his shirt unbuttoned along the way.

He needed another shower, if only to get his hair conditioned again (damn humidity) and to be alone for just a little while longer. He couldn’t even work half a day tomorrow, and he needed to decide if he was coming in at all.

When he stepped into his bedroom, there was hot tea in his favorite mug and jajecznica on the nightstand.

Fucking androids.


	11. Decryption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I see. And how are you intending to figure it out without his help if you can’t figure it out without his help?”  
> “Well…I was hoping that maybe I can connect with you and figure it out?”  
> “You want to what?”

“You’re awake already?”

The sun hadn’t even rose yet. Connor had only slept about three hours before he woke up and he gave up on going back to sleep, and when he had slunk downstairs for coffee, had found his android sitting on the couch, Sumo sprawled over him, pinning him into place, and watching the fish.

Connor was still not sure what to say to him after their cab ride, so he just walked past them and headed straight for his coffee maker.

Once he had his life blood in his hand, he moved to join Sumo in sitting on the android.

“Can’t tell if this means you’re still mad or I’m forgiven.”

“Thanks for cooking for me last night.”

“I’m taking this as I’m forgiven.”

“What did you do all night?”

“I started the decryption process on that deviant’s journal, it’s currently a background process. After that, I decided to actively go over your notes again. If I’m wrong, can you explain where I went wrong so that I can account for it?”

“That’s just one of my theories. It’s not even the one I am paying attention to right now. All it was that in Daniel, I recognized a string of code that I remember Elijah having worked on for months because it was getting his first project to act a little bit irrationally.”

“And which one is Daniel again?”

“The deviant who took a little girl hostage. I managed to save her, but…”

“But you were taken to the hospital to treat a serious injury, right?” HK800 reached up to his arm, over the scar that seems to stretch across the width of his left arm, right under his bicep. His thumb went over it, absent-mindedly, but he noticed the way Connor seemed to shiver a little while he analyzed it.

It had been deep, that was certain. Ligaments had been damaged, the parasympathetic nervous system cut off and since then reconnected and repaired, though not as perfectly as it had once been. He would have been bleeding badly, his arm would have been completely useless at the time.

Humans were so fragile and couldn’t even be taken somewhere to get a replacement attached. If they shut down, they wouldn’t wake back up in a new body, perfectly fine.

There were no rational reasons as to why Connor chose to keep himself in harm’s way, as he typically did. Humans were irrational, he supposed.

“Right.” Connor sighed softly, shifting a bit to get off HK800’s stomach and away from the scrutiny.

“So you think it might have been a code.”

“Or a glitch caused by it, at the very least.”

“You know, if you’re just honest with him, maybe he’ll just tell you if that’s even a possibility.”

Connor shook his head. “You don’t know him the way that I do. Elijah, he’s three steps ahead of me, every single time. I know it might sound weird to an android, because this kind of dynamic doesn’t quite exist for you guys, but if you don’t come at him already knowing that you’ve got him dead to rights, he’s going to make you believe exactly what he wants you to, and even then, there’s a good chance that he will find a way to make you feel like you’re an awful person for bringing it up and make you drop it. There’s no way I can just call and ask him until I know exactly what that code is for.”

“I see. And how are you intending to figure it out without his help if you can’t figure it out without his help?”

“Well…I was hoping that maybe I can connect with you and figure it out?”

HK800’s LED cycled yellow, his processors temporarily trying to catch up and figure out what the hell Connor just said. “You want to _what_?”

“What’s wrong?”

“I think you better explain what you mean by that.”

“I meant using my tablet to open up your programming and seeing if the line exists within your data, and if not, placing it in and seeing what happens. What did you _think_ I meant?”

The android stared back for a second before just shaking his head. “…Don’t worry about that. Sure, let me sit up and you can get started.”

Connor lured Sumo off with the promise of breakfast, and when he came back, full mug of coffee in hand, the HK800 was sitting on the couch, tablet already in his hand.

“Uploading my code already, figured you might wanna save a little time.” He paused. “Then again, are you sure you wanna start work this early? You only got two hours to go before you hit the limit that Fowler put on you, you know.”

“Well,” Connor drawled out slightly, “What he doesn’t know can’t hurt him, right? And it isn’t like this is for the case, per se, I play with code all the time, he can’t prove a thing in the end.”

“…You’re gonna end up working yourself to death, you know that, right?”

Connor grinned, opening the new file on his tablet and scrolling through. “I’ll be alright. Just register it as one of my hobbies, because I’ve been looking over code for years.” He was nowhere near as good at it as Elijah, but he liked to think that he knew his way around an android’s programming by now.

A bit instinctively, Connor went to stretch out on the couch, back moving to HK800’s chest, head resting on a broad shoulder as he surfed. He heard his phone alert him to a text message, but was too absorbed into his work to bother, so his android opened it promptly.

“You might wanna check your phone, Connor.”

“…What did you call me?”

“Sorry, too familiar to call you Connor while you’re pretty much sprawled in my lap?”

“No, it’s fine,” Connor told him, reaching for his phone. “Just the first time you called me that, is all.”

“…I called you that in the scrap yard. Did you not hear me?”

“I don’t remember you calling me that. It’s okay though. It sounds good coming from you.”

On his phone was an encrypted text from an android serial number that he didn’t recognize. Thankfully, most of it was easy to decode, and he could get an image file open, and translate some of the text.

 _Just a little something to help you out since you helped us. Use it wisely_. _Love, Traci_.

The android looked over his shoulder. “A ship?”

“It says Jericho on it!” Connor said, sitting up entirely now, leaning over his phone, feet hitting the floor.

“…I missed something,” HK800 told him.

Connor waved his hand dismissively. “I need you to pinpoint the location of this ship!”

HK800’s LED went yellow, saving the picture for himself. “That’s not going to be as easy as you think, you know.”

“Why not?”

“Because Michigan’s a huge fucking state with two stretches of land?” he replied, lifting an ashen eyebrow at Connor. “I can locate this rust bucket or I can decode the journal, I don’t have enough RAM for both.”

The enthusiasm in Connor’s face died, and HK800 felt something tug at his processes over it. Most of the time, as far as he could gather, Connor was not one for outward shots of excitement…or any emotion, really, it all stayed under the surface.

“I can always go back to the other one, you know. I believe that finding the ship might take a little less time if I can get more information to cross reference, but as far as I can tell, they will take roughly the same time without finding that girl’s location, and her tracker’s not working. Which one takes priority, detective?”

“…Let’s find Jericho.”

“Got it.” HK800 switched the priority decryption, and Connor grabbed Sumo’s leash to begin their typical morning run, now that the sun was out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor HK800 knew Connor was flirtatious, but he literally had no idea how Connor was planning to manage THAT act!


	12. Rooftops

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You know what they say: a rooftop view in London looks the same as one in Brooklyn...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another split chapter because tomorrow's will be a long one!
> 
> Expect lots of HK800 POV for the second half of it.

Coming home to seeing the news was not exactly music to Connor’s ears, nor was Fowler calling him to tell him to spend those two hours he had left investigating what the hell happened. That voice was unmistakable, and that just made everything worse. How the hell had Markus survived a neutralization of that caliber?

Once he was in the elevator, Connor leaned against his shoulder some, trying to seek some sort of assurance, maybe even validation at this point. To be honest...Connor was getting exhausted. If he was honest, he's been exhausted since August. If he thought too much about it, he was sure last night, short as it may have been, was the best sleep he had managed in months.

He made a mistake last night, things got out of hand, and that was all the energy he had been able to muster and now he was running on the reserves. Nothing about this investigation seemed to be going right. He had pulled a gun on his own fucking android, for Christ’s sake, thinking that fail safes that he himself had ordered installed were signs that maybe his android was going deviant. He was a fucking joke at this point.

His heart would be in the investigation, but his head wasn't going to be, Connor knew it, and that's how you make mistakes in negotiation. It was no wonder he was being ordered to only work 80 hours this week. This was the perfect setup for him to crash and burn and then take their already thinned out forces to come pick up the pieces of _his_ mess.

Everything that Connor had spent his life working for, that image of the perfect detective, capable of handling anything and everything thrown at him without an afterthought and without complaint, the perfect son, athletic, popular, and intelligent with a good job waiting for him out of college, so much more deserving of the praise he was starved for than his super-genius brother and his company of fake people that were programmed to be strong when they needed to be, compassionate when they needed to be, all without the drawbacks of exhaustion or emotions, everything Connor kind of longed to be, it was all starting to chip away. Sure, nobody was perfect, but after hearing that so many times from dismissive parents, paired with praises as Elijah made yet another breakthrough in his research, there was very little comfort in those words.

He was going to have to face his own synthetic life later. Right now, though, it was time to throw himself into the only distraction he had to his miserable existence. Thankfully, he knew enough psychology to push through emotions, even if they were simulated ones.

"Hi, Ben! What happened here?"

Ben was kind enough to help him out with what they knew. A group of androids, well-organized, had managed to break into the news room to broadcast their declaration, and then escaped as fast as they came in. Connor could barely see the thirium on the far end of the news station, but it looked like a handprint, and off he went to investigate.

\---

HK800 had been staring at the screen, trying to make out any hint about how they had gotten in here. There didn’t seem to be any sign of forced entry, and somebody had to have seen them from the security cameras.

_Curiouser and curiouser, cried Alice…_

He paid no mind to the scrutinizing looks he was getting from the newcomers, in their SWAT gear and trench coats. Who the hell did they think they were.

“Do you mind?” came a voice right behind him. Ah, the bigwig.

“I’m trying to hear them talk,” he replied, and suddenly felt himself being jerked back and his horseshoe haircut was suddenly in his way.

“Hey, don’t fuck up the audio by playing around with that, it’s not a toy.”

He heard the door close on the opposite end of the room and cursed under his breath when he saw that Connor was no longer present. His temporary obstacle forgotten, he moved quickly through the door.

\---

Connor’s breath caught almost immediately when he opened the door. The crosswinds up here were absolutely furious, and a glance toward the edge of the building showed that the barrier that could keep him from falling forever (he would never know because his lungs would collapse before he could reach the bottom) was pretty much non-existent.

He hated this. He had to go back, he couldn’t breathe, the wind was far too strong, even if he was safely away from the edge he felt like he could fall at any minute. Connor pounded on his chest with the heel of his hand, trying to force his lungs to work remind his heart what its rhythm should feel like.

Without looking behind him, he already knew what that tug on his collar was, the sturdy arm going around his shoulders as the door closed to the ghastly scene bringing safety, the gruff, soft voice telling him not to do that was both distant and too close at the same time, and his attempts to steady his breath just got Connor pulled into a hug, the whir of fans under the chassis just as welcome as any heartbeat.

Wait. The whir of fans. HK800 had his triptocaine in his inside pocket.

He wasn’t even discreet about it, he just reached in, popped the cap, and without thinking, using the bulk of his android as a shield, snorted straight from the glass, not once, but twice, and the effects were intense and near immediate.

“…Sorry. I’m sorry,” he told the android’s neck, letting him pull him away to look him over.

In reply, the HK800 reached under his nose, collected the blue powder that had gathered at the edges, and licked it off his finger.

“…What are you doing…?” Connor asked, slow, not sure if he was tripping or if he actually saw what he just saw.

“Getting rid of evidence. We got company down there.  Go take a coffee break and sober up.”

After a few seconds, when Connor felt much more alert and able to process things correctly, he went to do so.

Strange. Why wasn’t the impending feeling of dread leaving his chest yet?


End file.
